Source: Law & Liberty
by John C Pinheiro
“[A]rguing about tariffs has a long American pedigree, dating back to the administration of the first president, George Washington. There are three important lessons we can learn from this early American tariff debate. The first and most important lesson is that each system proposed in the 1790s, like all centralized systems of industrial policy and tariffs, allowed government to choose winners and losers. Second, at a time when some form of mercantilism was still the default position for nearly all Americans, there was still vigorous debate. And third, tariffs are fundamentally a moral issue.” (04/23/25)
https://lawliberty.org/lessons-from-early-americas-tariff-wars/